
Podcast: Ep411: Poems in Practice and in Theory
August 5, 2022
Author(s): The New York Times
Podcast: The Book Review
1 / 1Poems in Practice and in Theory
- 1. Poems in Practice and in Theory
About
Elisa Gabbert, the Book Review's On Poetry columnist, visits the podcast this week to discuss writing about poetry and her own forthcoming collection of poems, her fourth, āNormal Distance.ā āWhen Iām writing what I would call nonfiction or an essay or just pure prose, Iām really trying to be accurate,ā Gabbert says. āIām not lying, Iām really telling you what I think. Thereās very minimal distance between my persona on the page and who I really am. And then when Iām writing poetry, that persona really takes on more weight. Iām definitely creating more distance, and it really feels more like fiction or even more like theater, I might say. Iām really more creating a character thatās going to be speaking this monologue Iām writing.ā Ian Johnson visits the podcast to talk about his review of āGolden Age,ā a novel by Wang Xiaobo recently translated by Yan Yan. The novel, set against Maoās Cultural Revolution, made waves in China when it was originally published there in the 1990s. āIt was controversial primarily because of sex, thereās a lot of sex in the novel,ā Johnson says. āThe sex is not really described in graphic detail; this isnāt Henry Miller or something like that. Itās more like theyāre having sex to make a point: that theyāre independent people and theyāre not going to be trampled by the state. And itās very humorous ā he talks about sex using all kinds of euphemisms, like ācommit great friendship,ā stuff like that. Itās meant to be a sort of parody, a somewhat absurd version of a romance.ā Also on this weekās episode, Elisabeth Egan and Dave Kim talk about what people are reading. John Williams is the host. Here are the books discussed in this weekās āWhat Weāre Readingā: āTime Shelterā by Georgi Gospodinov, translated by Angela Rodel āThe Displacementsā by Bruce Holsinger āThe Annotated Wizard of Ozā by L. Frank Baum, edited by Michael Patrick Hearn We would love to hear your thoughts about this episode, and about the Book Reviewās podcast in general. You can send them to books@nytimes.com.
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The New York Times
The world's top authors and critics join host Gilbert Cruz and editors at The New York Times Book Review to talk about the week's top books, what we're reading and what's going on in the literary world. Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Listen to this podcast in New York Times Audio, our new iOS app for news subscribers. Download now at nytimes.com/audioapp